


Sip and Gulp

by bryozoans



Category: Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Drug Use, Drug Use, Forgive Me, M/M, godammit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2016-08-09
Packaged: 2018-08-07 16:40:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7722091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bryozoans/pseuds/bryozoans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Okay, this is my friend Emmett's fucking fault. He told me to write about Sonic and Tails living together, older and washed up, doing drugs and nearly homeless. </p><p>I didn't mean to actually do it but it got out of hand. Expect a bunch of bullshit from here on out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sip and Gulp

**Author's Note:**

> The date at the top is the day I wrote this.

11/1/15  
It was afternoon, and the neighborhood was quiet, though not completely.

 

The day was dead hot, the air lazy and sluggish as a wet blanket over the streets. The sound of children playing was crisp in the air, the sound of a basketball sharp and sudden to the ear even if it was a street over. The roads were empty, the houses along them appearing the same. The two apartment buildings were sleeping horses, bodies tall and square and deceptively leaning in the afternoon rays.

Sun slated through the second story window; light spilled like sliced mangoes over the mattress that lay under its sill. And as the light crept slowly across the floor to the ticking of an old grandfather clock, a foot twitched from beneath a thin sheet cover.

Miles’ eyes opened, gray eyes turned silver and squinting by the intrusion of the sun. He covered his face with a hand, groaning softly in his throat. It felt slightly burned and polluted. Not unusual for a morning after. He rolled his tongue around in his mouth, gathering spit, and leaned over the side of the mattress to hock it into the corner. It relieved some of the taste, though not much.

He sat up fully, back popping as he stretched. Everything felt too slow, too dull. It was his least favorite part of the day. Getting up and acknowledging you were still alive. His hand was still resting over his eyes, though he could peek considerably more through his fingers as the minutes ground by. Sonic was in the corner, not quite where Miles remembered leaving him. It wasn’t surprising for him to move around considerably in his sleep. Sleeping dogs had nothing on Sonic in the “running dreams” category.

“Sonic,” Miles tested his voice. It croaked loudly in the apartment, but the hedgehog did not stir in response. Not even the flick of an ear. Years before, it was Sonic that would have been prodding him awake, asking him to get up, come on, let’s go. Now the roles were reversed. 

 

Miles dropped the effort, his eyes stinging again already from over exposure. He got up slowly, legs rickety, and felt with a foot along the side of the bed for his slippers. The mattress had no box spring; much like a puzzle in a thrift shop, found things came incomplete. His foot connected with a fuzzy, nearly threadbare bunny slipper, and he skillfully dragged it out of its hiding place with a toe. The day had warmed the apartment to the point of sweating, and his fur felt like a snug sweater, but Miles dared not walk across the floor without them. Sonic shed quills in droves equivalent to a dying Christmas tree, and much like pine needles, these quills congregated in every corner and lay hidden in every crevice the barren, concrete floor provided. 

Always ready to surprise you with a prick in your paw pad.

The other bunny slipper was easily reclaimed, and he shuffled across the floor to his lifelong friend, back hunched and elderly.

“Sonic,” he said again, his throat a little clearer, the burning feeling being worked away by vocal exercise. He nudged the blue foot hazard on the floor, being careful so the slipper’s thin fabric would not be penetrated by a stray quill. Shoulders twitched at the touch, and a lean back stretched, two very green eyes staring up from the floor.

“Morning, Tails,” he offered a little smile, not looking at all burned out from the night before. That was definitely Sonic. Chipper. Miles still had no idea how he managed to look fresh in the morning after lighting up for hours on end. It evaded his sluggish mind as easily as the faint feeling of… something at the mention of the old nickname. He didn’t know why Sonic kept that up, either. 

It was unpleasant.

“Morning,” Miles rumbled, scratching a stubbly chin. He didn’t bother to keep up with the scruff. It grew back too fast to be worth the effort.

They didn’t eat breakfast anymore. Even if there had been food to consume as breakfast, they wouldn’t have been hungry for it. The highs made your stomach empty and kept it that way. Sonic sat up, rolled over. Thin, spindly legs sprawled from under the hem of a long T-shirt. It was surprising he was wearing clothes at all.

Miles moved into the kitchen, the archway open, and not really an archway but an opening in the walls. The arch had never been put in, or if it had, it had been ripped out by someone very tall and very resourceful. As far as Miles was concerned, the apartment had never been finished, and he and Sonic had made a consensus that whoever had started it must have aborted it with the best intentions, as the utilities had been installed and in working order when they’d found the place.

When had they found this place again?

Miles tried to remember as he scrounged in the kitchen, pushing aside wrappers and cereal boxes on the counter to find the only washcloth they owned. He heard Sonic moving around in the other part of the apartment, the high ceiling throwing the sound and distorting it to the point of indistinction. He found the washcloth after much shifting of counter refuse, crumbs sticking to it along with slight, mildew dampness. He shook it out onto the floor, to collect with the quills and whatever else was lurking there in the dust. 

“You got this month’s rent?” 

It was asked right in Miles’ ear, out of nowhere, but he didn’t jump, barely twitched. Living with Sonic had made him impervious to surprise, as the hedgehog was near silent when he moved, kept light from years of moving fast on his feet. He’d never gotten clumsy, not even after the shoes were gone. He shook the thought from his head. He didn’t need to think about the shoes. Not right now. 

“Yeah. I’ll hand it over later,” Miles said, sweeping some crumbs into the sink with the washcloth. 

But there was no rent. There was no landlord to give it to. It was an elaborate lie that they had made up, to make themselves feel better about squatting in such a nice place. They did not deserve such shelter, and so they saved whatever pocket change they could scrounge in the cupboard above the sink, a whole shoebox full of their pittance, and never spent it.

Sonic had once made an offhand joke about saving up for a vacation to Green Hill Zone with their rent money, a joke which left them both with bitter tastes in their mouths. There were too many memories in that colorful and distant place, memories that neither of them wished to talk about. Miles didn’t know why he was attempting to clean. It was a useless feat. Instead he shook the crumbs out again, carelessly having forgotten what he’d needed the square of fabric originally for anyway. He draped it over the edge of the sink, hoping it would dry and not procure mold. 

Sonic had left him after his inquiry over the rent money, and Miles could hear him rattling around their small piles of belongings. Probably searching for clothes. Miles felt he should join him. The apartment, despite its airiness, was beginning to feel cramped. 

He was slowly waking up, the world more real and less fuzzy. His regular breathing was breaking the slur of mucus in the back of his sinuses, and he felt his shortness of breath may evict itself within the hour. His eyes had completely adjusted to the burning orange sunlight, and going outside seemed more favorable now rather than just attemptable. 

The feeling that it would be a better day already was unregrettable.


End file.
